Question about University of Illinois

[FutureVet90]

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are you applying/ or already attend there?

due to my academic situation, i'm liking what i'm seeing about their program. coming from ohio, what's it like living around there? safety? expenses? attractions?

 

[cowgirla]

are you applying/ or already attend there?

due to my academic situation, i'm liking what i'm seeing about their program. coming from ohio, what's it like living around there? safety? expenses? attractions?

"Due to your academic situation" you should worry about passing all your classes next semester and not about getting into vet school anywhere

 

[bannanababy146]

Right, before you focus on what vet school you want to go to, you need to get your grades way up. Don't even worry about where you go until then. If you live in Ohio though, that will be your best bet for vet school. I'm not sure what attracts you to Illinois. I think they do have something where they forget your undergrad grades if you get a graduate degree (or its grades six years+). But your gpa for OSS schools still needs to be much higher. I talked to the dean in champaign and he said typically oos students gpa are higher than their average and IS is lower.

But yes living down there is pretty cheap unless you live close to the main campus. Fortunately, most graduate students tend to live off campus (but then you probably need a car, not a ton of buses go to the vet med building.)

The best advice I can give you is to solely focus on your grades and don't worry about anything else until then. One step at a time. Goodluck!

 

[EngrSC]

are you applying/ or already attend there?

due to my academic situation, i'm liking what i'm seeing about their program. coming from ohio, what's it like living around there? safety? expenses? attractions?

Vet school isn't even an option if you can't pass basic science classes. Focus on your health issues and address the reasons why you're unable to succeed in basic classes.

 

[anotherbusybee]

"Due to your academic situation" you should worry about passing all your classes next semester and not about getting into vet school anywhere

Seriously. As an applicant, I'm almost offended by what you're (FutureVet) implying. What. You think it's easier or something? It's not.

 

[FutureVet90]

Seriously. As an applicant, I'm almost offended by what you're (FutureVet) implying. What. You think it's easier or something? It's not.

i wasnt saying it was easier. i actually like what they have to offer.

but instead posters are coming in focusing on something that isnt related to my thread title

 

[grumpycat]

Retract your claws people 😉

FutureVet, I take it from your past posts that you're still in frosh year? UofI does have its own unique academic forgiveness program with which they will disregard freshman grades if you petition for them to do so. Of course, you will have to already be holding a Bachelor's and will also have to retake any prerequisites that were taken during that time. If this is the case for you, perhaps you should seek whatever medical or academic help that you need, retake those prerequisite courses later on, and do very, very well in them.

I'm not sure what Ohio is like so I can't compare the two for you. Urbana is pretty quiet and boring, but is still a college town (= undergraduate Greek life and sports are pretty big deals). If you require a more stimulating environment, Chicago is about a 2.5-hour drive away. And yes, there are a lot of cornfields. 👍 But at least you won't have to deal with high rent prices, traffic or tourists 😴

 

[FutureVet90]

Retract your claws people 😉

FutureVet, I take it from your past posts that you're still in frosh year? UofI does have its own unique academic forgiveness program with which they will disregard freshman grades if you petition for them to do so. Of course, you will have to already be holding a Bachelor's and will also have to retake any prerequisites that were taken during that time. If this is the case for you, perhaps you should seek whatever medical or academic help that you need, retake those prerequisite courses later on, and do very, very well in them.

I'm not sure what Ohio is like so I can't compare the two for you. Urbana is pretty quiet and boring, but is still a college town (= undergraduate Greek life and sports are pretty big deals). If you require a more stimulating environment, Chicago is about a 2.5-hour drive away. And yes, there are a lot of cornfields. 👍 But at least you won't have to deal with high rent prices, traffic or tourists 😴

thank you.

and i became junior this past fall 2012

 

[cvanthof]

:troll:

 

[FutureVet90]

:troll:

you can simply stay out of my threads.

 

[cvanthof]

you can simply stay out of my threads.

I just don't understand why you keep starting them. You are making yourself look silly with your deck full of new threads. Everyone has given you PLENTY of advice. I'm sorry if it isn't the advice you want to hear, but it's all constructive, and if you took it, you could actually make a change for the better. However, I believe you just like thinking about improving yourself, instead of actually taking action. That is one trait that will NEVER get you into vet school.

And I am not the first or last person who will tell you this, undoubtedly.

Dang it, I caved and fed the troll.

 

[Lightinthedark]

I have applied to the University of Illinois this year. I am interested in small animal surgery/oncology. May someone provide me with an idea of what program is like. For instance, is it hands-on or PBL? Is the program well-rounded? Thanks for your help. 🙂

 

[FutureVet90]

I have applied to the University of Illinois this year. I am interested in small animal surgery/oncology. May someone provide me with an idea of what program is like. For instance, is it hands-on or PBL? Is the program well-rounded? Thanks for your help. 🙂

i read that it's hands-on starting on the first day

 

[yejjers]

I have applied to the University of Illinois this year. I am interested in small animal surgery/oncology. May someone provide me with an idea of what program is like. For instance, is it hands-on or PBL? Is the program well-rounded? Thanks for your help. 🙂

Hi, I'm not a student at uiuc but I do know this. There's rotations during your first year at a clinic for a week if you signed up for it, and if you didn't get the chance to, that's fine because there's another opportunity during your second year to do a week of clinical rotation. I'm sure up until third year is mostly academics and studying on cadavers, etc. Fourth year, you start your rotations I believe in summer if I'm correct and it's two weeks per rotation. From the students I spoke to at the clinic, they seem to all like the program. Hope that somewhat helps. 🙂

 

[arya1218]

I know I got past Phase I of the application status but I have heard nothing yet about interviews.

 

[Tco87]

I have applied to the University of Illinois this year. I am interested in small animal surgery/oncology. May someone provide me with an idea of what program is like. For instance, is it hands-on or PBL? Is the program well-rounded? Thanks for your help. 🙂

Hi! I'm a first year at UIUC and you can feel free to PM if you want more info.

The first eight weeks of your first year are clinical rotations that you are randomly assigned to. Each rotation is one week long. The amount of hands on activity varies significantly. For instance, one of my rotations wasn't actually in the clinic - we met at a local pet store in the morning to discuss husbandry and then in the afternoon we met in the Clinical Skills Learning Center where we practiced exams and blood draws on the animals we learned about in the morning. For a different rotation, the most I did was follow around a fourth year student and restrain animals.
Second year you have seven more rotations but you can put in requests for which rotations you prefer. There are eight rotations that everyone has to take either first or second year.
The last eight weeks of third year are spent in clinical rotations and you're treated like a fourth year.
Our core curriculum isn't PBL, it's traditional classroom stuff.
I'm not sure what you mean when you ask if the curriculum's "well-rounded". If you clarify I can let you know my opinion.

Other perks to UIUC: We have a student run wildlife clinic that is a great opportunity to get hands on experience and help wildlife in our area.

 

[Lightinthedark]

What I meant by "well-rounded" is that we are exposed to many different aspects of veterinary medicine before we take our NAVLE/graduate.

 

[Tco87]

What I meant by "well-rounded" is that we are exposed to many different aspects of veterinary medicine before we take our NAVLE/graduate.

You have the opportunity to expose yourself to a lot of different career paths in vet med here. I've only finished one semester so I can't tell you how it is for the full four years, but between the core curriculum, electives, and clubs you can get a lot of exposure to different things. For instance, for rotations you can do a toxicology/pharmacology rotation and part of it involves going to the ASPCA poison control center and seeing what they do there. There's a summer research program if you're interested in lab med. We have a lot of active clubs that let you get more experience in production medicine, equine, wildlife/exotics, etc.

I know you said you're interested in small animal surgery. We have a surgery club that has several wet labs a year. This year I practiced suturing a pig's foot and did a skin reconstruction wet lab through them. Students here also have to take a surgical skills rotation and do a rotation with either small animal soft tissue surgery or small animal orthopedic surgery before 4th year.

If you have any other questions or if I didn't really answer your question, please let me know!